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Edit and/or remove messages

I know this works on Windows, but it may also work on Mac, however I haven’t tested this on Mac.

You can right click on message in a chat window to edit or remove the message. ?This is helpful when posting the wrong message to the wrong person (you can remove it) or you can edit a message when you made a typo.

The edit last message sent, simply click the up arrow on your keyboard, edit the message and press enter to re-post the updated message.

Sign Into Multiple Skype Accounts

Unlike some messaging programs, Skype doesn’t allow you to easily log into multiple accounts. Try to launch the Skype shortcut once you’ve already opened Skype and it will just bring your already-open Skype window to the front. But you may have multiple Skype accounts — perhaps you have one for work and one for personal use.

Rather than open Skype as another?Windows user account, Skype has a hidden option you can use to open a new Skype instance.

Skype will open a second Skype window, which you can log into as another Skype account. If you wanted to use this frequently, you could create a new Windows shortcut that opened Skype with the /secondary switch.

Share you screen

You can share your screen with someone on Skype – useful to do presentations etc. withouth expensive software such as WebEx or TeamViewer.

When on a call (group or individual call) click on the + icon and then on “share screens”.

IRC Style commands

You can also enter commands by prefixing them with a forward slash (/) – This way of interacting should be familiar for folks who used IRC back in the day…

The commands available differ on the amount of people in the chat – i.e. is this a group chat or a one-on-one chat. ?For one-on-one chats the only available commands are:

Adds a contact to the chat. For instance:/add?alex_cooper1?will add that member to the chat.

/alertson [text]

Allows you to specify what needs to appear in a chat for you to be notified. For example,/alertson London?will only alert you when the word “London” appears in the chat.

/alertsoff

Disable message notifications.

/clearpassword

Removes the password security.

/find [text]

Finds specific text in a chat. For example,/find?Charlie?will return?the first instance?of the word “Charlie” in the chat.

/get allowlist

Details people with access to the chat.

/get banlist

Details people banned from the chat.

/get creator

Details the person who created the chat.

/get guidelines

See the current chat’s guidelines.

/get options

Details active options for current chat – see /set options below for a list of the options available.

/get password_hint

Get the password hint.

/get role

Details your role in the chat.

/get uri

Creates a URL link that other people can use to join the group chat.

/golive

Starts a group call with other participants of the chat.

/info

Details number of people in chat and maximum number available.

/kick [Skype Name]

Eject chat member. For instance,/kick?alex_cooper1?will eject that member from the chat.

/kickban [Skype Name]

Ejects chat member and prevents them from rejoining chat. For instance,/kickban?alex_cooper1?will eject that member from the chat and ban them from rejoining.

/leave

Leave current group chat.

/me [text]

Your name will appear followed by any text you write. For instance,?/me working from home?will cause the phrase “working from home” to appear next to your name in the chat. You can use this to send a message about your activities or status.

/set allowlist [[+|-]mask] ..

Sets the members allowed in the chat. For instance,?/set?allowlist?+alex_cooper1?will allow that member to join the chat.

/set banlist [[+|-]mask] ..

Sets which members are banned from the chat. For instance,?/set?banlist?+alex_cooper1will?ban that member?from the chat./set?banlist?-alex_cooper1?will allow them to rejoin it.

/set guidelines [text]

Set a chat’s guidelines. For instance,?/set guidelines No spoilers!?These can be returned to be viewed in the chat by the command?/get guidelines.

/set options [[+|-]flag]

Sets options for this chat. For example:?/set options -JOINING_ENABLED?switches off the JOINING_ENABLED option, while?/set options +JOINERS_BECOME_APPLICANTS?will switch on the JOINERS_BECOME_APPLICANTS option.

The available flags are listed below:

HISTORY_DISCLOSED –?Joiners can see the conversation that took place before they joined. The limit that they can see is either 400 messages or?two weeks of time, depending on which is reached first.

JOINERS_BECOME_APPLICANTS – New users?can join the chat, but?cannot post or receive messages until authorized by?a CREATOR?or MASTER (see the table below for more information on roles).

On BlackBerry devices with a keyboard you can press the following keys: left shift, alt and H

On newer or other devices, please?reference BlackBerry Knowledge Base Article?KB05026: (Details below for ease of reference.)

To locate the personal identification number (PIN), International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number, electronic serial number (ESN), or Mobile Equipment Identifier (MEID) number on the BlackBerry smartphone, complete the following steps:

Note:?The?Options?icon might be located in a different location on the Home screen depending on which theme is in use, or whether the icon has been moved to a different folder. If the?Options?icon is not visible on the Home screen, it might be located in the?Settings?folder.

The?PIN?and?IMEI?can also be found on a sticker underneath the battery on the BlackBerry smartphone.

If you are working on a company computer and your company has a server then most likely you need to use the domain method. ?(Domain username are usually in the form of DOMAIN\username or [email protected])

Mix letters, numbers and symbols, and use case sensitivity (upper and lower case letters). This mixture is known as “pseudo-random alpha-numeric combination”; using this, it is almost impossible to “crack” somebody’s password. (i.e. instead of “password,” try “pAsS34%(6*2woRd,” etc.)

Find a good way to remember. A good way to do this is to choose the first letters of a sentence that you will remember. e.g. “I have 2 dogs called Rover and Fido” gives: Ih2dcRaF

Use punctuation to your advantage. To incorporate a colon into the previous example, remember the sentence as “I have 2 dogs: Rover and Fido”, which would give: Ih2d:RaF

Try to memorize the password, and avoid writing it down. Somebody could very easily find the slip of paper that the password is written on.

The longer the better. Don’t make a password that’s less than 8 characters. Anything less can easily be deduced from brute force software.

Take the street you grew up on, and your first pet/something hard to guess from your past, put a number sign in between, substitute some letters for numbers, and, voila! A great password. For example: Bill grew up on Ocean Avenue, and his first pet was Rocky. His password would be: 0c3an#r0cky You can add random capitals to make it more secure.

Do not use the same password for everything. If someone finds this password, they would have access to everything. At the very least, make at least one password for sensitive things (i.e. online banking, etc.) and one for everything else (AIM, email, etc.). Here is an example:

Let us suppose you have 5 email accounts, 3 operating system passwords, 3 bank accounts (each with user name, password, extra security pin), 10 internet forum user/passes, 1 cellular phone (uses 2 to 4 pins). (If you are a programmer or db administrator, multiply the total by 3). Say for each of these, you chose a variation of “pAsS34%(6*2woRd,”. Try to memorize 20 of those gibberish sequences! It’s quite difficult, but if you make your sentences relevant to each situation, it will be easier – for example, for banking, your sentence could be “I want to have 1 million pounds every day” (Iw2h1m?￡ed), and for your emails it could be “I hope no one reads my emails or hacks in!” (Ihn1rmeohi!).

Use something you see whenever you need this password to generate the password. Federal Security Bank might lead to FsBmA3456.

Use a telephone keypad or 10 character phrase (i.e. blackstump) to encode numbers as letters or vice versa.

Another way is using just numbers, but with an algorithm. You could take your birthday, for instance. For a random birthday, let’s use 23/4/87. 2+3+4+8+7=24. 2+4=6. And so your password is simple. now, take 6 and…. 2x2x2=8 4x2x2=16. 1+6=7. 7×7=49. 49×49=2401. This way, you have a password,(2401) and a way to crack it if you forget it!

Change your passwords. You should change your password at least every 30 to 60 days. You should also not re-use a password for at least a year.

One other way is to use a word, for example, wikihow, and move your fingers up one row on the keyboard. Wikihow becomes 28i8y92.

One more way is to create a random syntax (eg. 2 numbers, 5 letters, 1 punctuation mark and 2 more numbers) and randomly populate it with the characters you have said – 94IdmTg;66 could be a password created in this way. The downside of this method is that it is often difficult for most people to memorise passwords created in this way, but if you use it often enough it should become easier over time. This method is only really useful if you believe other people may overhear/attempt to find out your password, as computers will not find such a password any harder to crack than a password holding some meaning!

You could also use an entire?sentence?as a password – including spaces an punctuation. ?(E.g. “My computer is Secure as at 2013!!”)

This database can be accessed using either command line tools (such as OSQL and SQLCMD) or Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio. ?The Express version of Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio is free and can be downloaded from the Microsoft Download Center. ?The easiest is just to Google for “Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio Express download” – one of the top results should link to a Microsoft webpage. ?I recommend you only download this from Microsoft.

Once you have installed the Management Studio open it up.

NOTE: When working on Server 2008 and newer you will need to run Management Studio express as an administrator. ?Right click on the icon and then select “Run as administrator”. ?This is to ensure that UAC does not cause any problems.

Management Studio might show you the MICROSOFT##SSEE database in the dropdown list, however you won’t be able to connect to it. You must use a named pipe. ?So paste this into the server field:

\\.\pipe\mssql$microsoft##ssee\sql\query

Then used Windows Authentication and?voila?you should now have access to the database.

Note: that when you archive mails and you don’t have an online archive that the mails will be archived to a local PST file on your hard disc drive.? If your computer is lost or stolen or breaks then you will lose the archived mails, unless you have a backup of the PST file.

If the Quota Information option is not available then it most likely means that your quota is unlimited – i.e. there is no quota and your mailbox can grow in size as much as there is available space on the server.

A frustration that I have been having with Remote Desktop (mstsc.exe) on Windows 7 is that sometimes a window (remote session) just won’t maximize to full screen. ?It will maximize, but then have scroll bars on the right and/or bottom and not the usual blue bar at the top.

To alleviate the problem I have been starting all my remote desktop sessions via Start -> Run:

mstsc /v remote.example.com /f

The “/f” at the end forces a full screen. ?However I sometimes click on the “Restore Down” button by accident, instead of clicking on the “Minimize” button as intended, and try as you might, when you maximize the window, it just won’t go to full screen mode.

The solution is to press the CTRL-ALT-BREAK keys simultaneously. ?This key sequence toggles between “windowed” and full screen mode.

At first I thought this was going to turn into a nightmare and I was about to phone Appassure support, when I Googled the error message. ?I couldn’t find any information about this error pertaining to Appassure, but I did find a solution.

This seems to be a generic Windows Installer error that indicates that the installation media is corrupt.

I simply downloaded the installation files again, and hey presto it worked.

So if you get this error message I would suggest that you just try downloading the installer again.

I recently logged a call with Quickbooks South Africa (4th of Jan 2012) ?with a problem I had getting my Quickbooks 2010 company file to upgrade to Quickbooks 2012.

After being advised to uninstall and reinstall the program and a whole string of other problems they came to the?conclusion?that they cannot assist me.

Thereafter I contacted the Quickbooks UK offices. ?I advised them that I had spoken to the local Quickbooks office and that they could not help me. ?They again took me through the same procedures of uninstalling and reinstalling the product. ?Still no resolution. ?I then waited about a week before they got back to me. ?A support representative connected to my computer and redid all the diagnostics steps that had already been tried, including uninstalling .NET etc. ?Still no resolution. ?He then took a copy of my company file and advised that it could take up to 2 weeks before they got back to me.

Last night I received an e-mail from them:

I am writing to you regarding the QuickBooks Version 2010 Release 4 Company File send for review and received on Jan 17th, 2012.

As I understand it, you are unable to upgrade your QuickBooks version 2010 Company data file to version 2012 as it crashes during the upgrade process.

I have reviewed your file. I am able to upgrade the file to version 2012 if I shorten the business number.

The business number you have entered is 16 characters including numbers, alphabets, special characters and spaces. If you shorten it to 15 characters you should be able to upgrade it to version 2012.

Open the file in Version 2010, Go to the Company Menu and choose Company Information.

On the Company Information window, Click on the Business Number and shorten it by a character. I had removed one of the slash. You may want to remove some other character. But please make sure that the Business Number is not longer than 15 characters including numbers, alphabets, special characters and spaces. Click on OK to Save the Change.

Go back to the Company Menu and go to Company Information to ensure that the change was saved.

You can now upgrade the corrected file to version 2012 and it should upgrade without any issues.

I did as advised and my company file has been?successfully?upgraded to 2012.

I’m very happy that the problem has been resolved, it’s just horrific that it took a WHOLE MONTH to resolve such a silly problem. ?One would think that the programmers would have been able to put some sort of validation in the software to prevent this type of data validation issue.